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We couldn’t get him to name any names, but we did get Jimmy Akin to explain what the Bible has to say about the nature of the anti-Christ. Without doubt many will be surprised by just how little the anti-Christ is mentioned in the Bible, and that it is probably more accurate to talk about “anti-Christs.”
What does the Bible really say about the antichrist? Jimmy Akin next. Kind of continuing our end times theme from our last episode with Jimmy Akin, where we talked about the mark of the beast, in the modern world, we also have these figures who arise. There’s figures like Hitler and Stalin and now the great political leaders who are also very disturbing personalities, but also all kinds of celebrities. And you can become a worldwide figure just by how you put your makeup on, on Instagram. Who among these might be the antichrist? It’s perfectly natural for us to ask that question when we live in this mass society, and many of us are kind of alert for the antichrist, given all of the moral decline of our society, and in fact, the de-Christianization of much of the world. So we put it to Jimmy Akin, tell us what the Bible tells us about the antichrist. And we weren’t surprised at all. He had an answer.
Cy Kellett:
Jimmy Akin, senior apologist here at Catholic Answers and proprietor of Jimmy Akin’s Mysterious World. Thank you for being with us to talk about the antichrist and antichrists.
Jimmy Akin:
Hey, my pleasure, Cy Kellett.
Cy Kellett:
There’s a topic that’ll get you out of bed. I just want to start with the obvious question. Who is it? Who is the antichrist?
Jimmy Akin:
Well, there’s more than one. That’s one of the things that we learn when we read scripture. Now, it’s interesting, the term antichrist only appears in two books of the Bible and they’re not the ones you might think. People might think, “Oh, it’s going to be in Revelation.” Or, “Oh, maybe it’s in Daniel.” No. The only two books in which the term antichrist is mentioned are First John and Second John. Now, there are some figures in books like Revelation and Daniel that maybe are linked to the antichrist. Maybe, maybe not. But if you want to know what the Bible has to say about the antichrist, you got to look in First and Second John. And there’s only five verses that mention the antichrist.
So I’ll read them. In First John chapter two, John is writing and he says, “Children, it is the last hour. As you have heard the antichrist is coming, so now many antichrists have come. Therefore, we know that it is the last hour.” So right there, he says there’s not just one there’s many. He then continues in the next verse and says, “They,” the antichrists, “went out from us, but they were not of us. For if they had been of us, they would have continued with us. But they went out that it might be plain that they are not of us.” So these antichrists who are already there in the first century are former Christians. They used to be in the Christian community, but then they went out because they didn’t have a firm commitment to Christ.
So what is it that they’re saying now that makes them antichrists? Well, you keep reading, like three verses later, he says, “Who is the liar but he who denies that Jesus is the Christ. This is the antichrist, he who denies the father and the son.” So these ex-Christians are now saying Jesus is not the Christ. They’re denying him. And by extension, they’re denying the father because Jesus really is the Christ. So one of the characteristics of these antichrists is that they reject the idea that Jesus is the Christ. They may have gone back to paganism. They may have gone back to Judaism. One way or another, they left Christianity and are denying that Jesus is the Christ.
Then a couple of chapters later in chapter four, John says, “Every spirit which does not confess Jesus is not of God.” So he’s talking here about how in the first century, they would have prophets in churches that would be in contact with angelic spirits, but not all of the spirits were trustworthy. Some of them were demons, fallen angels. And they would say, “Oh yeah, Jesus is not God.” John then continues. “This is the spirit of antichrist of which you heard that it was coming and now is in the world already.” So the spirit of antichrist is these fallen demons who are claiming Jesus is not God, and thus they’re opposed to, or anti, Christ. And they’ve apparently tricked some people into thinking that Jesus is not the Christ and they’ve left the Christian community and become human antichrists.
The last verse where we read about antichrist is in Second John. In Second John, he writes, “Many deceivers have gone out into the world, men who will not acknowledge the coming of Jesus Christ in the flesh. Such a one is the deceiver and the antichrist.” So here, what characterizes antichrists is that they won’t acknowledge the coming of Jesus Christ in the flesh. And this may reflect several viewpoints. It might reflect the viewpoint that, okay, Jesus was just not the Christ at all, but it also could reflect a viewpoint that some heretics had in the late first and early second century. They were called docetists. The Greek word dokeó means to seem. And what they claimed was that Jesus was God, but he only seemed to be a man. And so it was like his humanity was an illusion and he didn’t really die on the cross as a result. And some scholars have thought that’s what John is thinking of here in this Second John passage, people who were saying Jesus only seemed to be a man, but he didn’t really come in the flash. And that’s a possibility here too.
One way or another though, these antichrists are opposed to Jesus. And they’re saying, which is why they’re called antichrist, they’re opposed to Christ, and they’re opposed to him either in saying he wasn’t really incarnate, or he wasn’t the Messiah, or he wasn’t God, or things like that. And that’s really what an antichrist is. Now, you’ll notice in the first passage we started with in First John, he talks about how you’ve heard how antichrist, singular, is coming. And that has led people to speculate that there will be a single major antichrist before the end of the world. And if so, he’s going to have these characteristics, just like the other antichrists and spirits preaching the antichrist doctrine.
There can be and likely is to be a final villain of world history who will deny that Jesus is God, or that he’s the Christ, or that he came in the flesh. It’s going to be something like that. The final antichrist, assuming there is one, which I think there will be, will make claims like that. And that has led people to speculate about how this final antichrist, could he be mentioned in other books of scripture, even though he’s not called that.
Cy Kellett:
So let me ask you this then. Why do you, because you’re very judicious about these things, why do you… Well, you’re judicious about these things, and what we just read doesn’t give an overwhelming indication that there will be this final antichrist. What convinces you that this is likely, that there is this character at the conclusion of history?
Jimmy Akin:
Partly it’s precedent because we see in both the Old Testament and the New Testament a history and prophecy of these major crises where God’s people are persecuted. And there’s a leader to those persecutions, whether it was Nebuchadnezzar, or Antiochus Epiphanes, or Nero Caesar, or whoever it may be. When God’s people get persecuted, there’s a leader involved. And from various passages in the New Testament, and the church acknowledges these in the Catechism of the Catholic church, before Christ comes again, there will be a final unleashing of the forces of evil where the church will be persecuted. And presumably, that final persecution will have a leader just like the previous ones. And so we can look at these passages that talk about these prophetic persecutors in the biblical books of prophecy and learn lessons about, okay, here’s what may happen in the future.
Cy Kellett:
Okay. So we can say that everyone who lies about Jesus, or denies his humanity, or denies him as the Messiah is in some way involved in this spirit of antichrist.
Jimmy Akin:
Yeah. That doesn’t mean they’re in bad conscience. They may have been innocently deceived. Let’s say you’re growing up in a family that, let’s say it’s a pagan family, or a Jewish family, or an atheist family. And you’re taught growing up, okay, Jesus is not really the Christ, and he’s not really God, and stuff like that. And you’re a little baby hearing this stuff as you grow up. You don’t know any different, but you’re still being deceived by the spirit of antichrist.
Cy Kellett:
That’s why I think more babies should listen to Jimmy Akin’s Mysterious World.
Jimmy Akin:
A lot of them do, I’m told.
Cy Kellett:
A lot of babies… I’m sure they do.
Jimmy Akin:
Well, I got a message today from a woman who wasn’t a baby, but who said, “I was just listening to your show with my daughter.”
Cy Kellett:
Oh, that’s great. Isn’t that great? So what do these other passages then tell us about this figure. I mean, it’s obvious why people would become fascinated with this figure. Once you say there is this figure, then you’re alert to the possibility of who might be that figure, what might that be like. I mean, you could see why this is titillating. So give us some more information from the other passages of scripture about who this figure is.
Jimmy Akin:
Well, in the Old Testament, there are some parallels to this figure in the book of Daniel. And those actually, though, look like they have some historical fulfillments as their initial primary fulfillment. Like Daniel, at one point, is talking about a figure that looks very much like Antiochus Epiphanes. Antiochus Epiphanes was a ruler from the Seleucid Empire, which was part of what had been Alexander the Great’s Empire. And he started to persecute the Jewish people. He wouldn’t let them practice their religion. He like sacrificed a pig to Zeus on the altar in Jerusalem, which was regarded by the authors of the Maccabees as a fulfillment of the abomination of desolation. Because it was this abomination that caused spiritual desolation in the temple. To sacrifice an unclean animal like a pig to a pagan god like Zeus, that was just horrific.
But then there are future fulfillments as well. Jesus, in the Olivet Discourse, which is his big prophetic discourse, you can find it, for example, in Mark 13, he’s talking about the destruction of the temple in AD 70. And he indicates there’s going to be another abomination of desolation. And of course, the temple was destroyed then by the Roman general Titus and his forces. And this may have future echoes, because in Second Thessalonians, St. Paul talks about how before the end, there will be a coming rebellion and a man of lawlessness that will lead that rebellion and that will want to be worshiped as God and will declare himself to be God. And people have said, “Oh, this man of lawlessness, that could be the same guy as the final antichrist.”
And then, of course, the big one is in the book of Revelation, where we read about the beast from the sea in Revelation chapter 13. It’s got seven heads, 10 horns. It rules the world. It wants to be worshiped as a God. It persecutes Christians. And it has the number 666. And you keep reading in Revelation 17, we learned that it’s the beast’s seven heads are both seven mountains, like the Seven Hills of Rome, and seven kings, like the first century line of Roman emperors. And then since John invites his readers, he says, “This calls for wisdom.” But you can calculate the number of the beast, which is 666.
Well, it so happens that in the first century line of Roman emperors, if you add up Nero Caesar in Hebrew or Aramaic, it comes up to 666. And so you put all that together, it looks like there’s an initial fulfillment of the beast as the persecuting Roman Empire and its emperors that persecuted Christians and wanted to be worshiped as gods. But because prophecy can repeat itself, there could be, in the final conflagration before the end of the world, there could be a future hero-like dictator, who is the final fulfillment of the beast. And thus, could also be a future fulfillment of antichrist.
Cy Kellett:
So what would we look for if we were to be alert for that person?
Jimmy Akin:
Someone who rules the world or a big chunk of it, like Nero did, and who wants to be worshiped as a God, and who persecutes Christians. Those are the three kind of essential things.
Cy Kellett:
Just so that I understand the nature of the deception, it seems to me from what St. John says, and please correct me if I’m misunderstanding this, that that person could not pretend even to accept Christ the incarnate God, because it says that person…
Jimmy Akin:
So whoever the final villain of world history is, if that person is an antichrist, he’s going to do the same things that John talks about in his letters. He’s going to say Jesus is not the Christ. Jesus is not God. Jesus did not come in the flesh. Things like that. Incidentally, in the time of the reformation, there was a theory that got proposed that the Pope is the antichrist. And this was kind of necessary for the reformers to propose because it helped relieve some cognitive tension that people had. There was cognitive dissonance because everybody knew the Catholic church is Christ’s church. That’s what everybody in Europe believed. So if you want to get people to come out of the Catholic church, you’ve got to explain, well, how does the Catholic church fit into God’s plan. Because it goes all the way back and it’s Christ’s church. So what’s your alternative account?
And they would say, “Okay, well, guess what? It’s not the original church. It’s a corrupt church. It’s actually the Whore of Babylon.” Because in the book of Revelation, you have these two great women figures. One is the bride of Christ. The other is the Whore of Babylon. And so if the Catholic church isn’t the bride of Christ, oh, we can say it’s the Whore of Babylon. And that would make the Pope the beast that leads it. And so the Pope is the antichrist.
Okay, I see how that could alleviate people’s cognitive dissonance if they’re leaving the church. But the Pope’s job is to be the vicar of Christ. He’s Christ’s representatives on earth. So he would kind of be undercutting his own authority if he were saying things like, “Oh yeah, Jesus wasn’t the Christ. And he wasn’t God. And he didn’t come in the flesh.” Yeah, no, see, the Pope is the last person in the world who’s going to fit the biblical description of the antichrist because he’d be undercutting his own job. Needless to say, Popes haven’t said that historically, and they’re not going to say that in the future. Their job is to be Christ’s under-shepherd here on earth.
Cy Kellett:
But then there’s all that Seven Hills imagery and all that, that because the Pope’s in Rome, I’m sure you can take what was once applied to Nero Caesar and apply that to the Pope as well to create your image.
Jimmy Akin:
And they would try to do that, but there are problems there. Number one, Vatican Hill, where the church is based, is outside of Rome. It’s not one of the Seven Hills. It’s on the wrong side of the Tiber river to be one of the Seven Hills. And so the church is not headquartered on the Seven Hills of Rome. It’s headquartered on this other hill that is outside of those. Also, so another problem is the folks who claim that the Pope would be the antichrist don’t believe that the Pope goes all the way back to St. Peter. They have to say that the papacy is a later invention.
Okay, so then, on that theory, it wouldn’t have existed in the first century when John is writing and he’s telling people about, “Hey, you can calculate the number of the beast today. You can do that. If you’ve got wisdom, you can add it up.” And when you do that, all the evidence points to the first century Roman Empire, the pagan empire that did persecute Christians, that did have political leaders who were emperors, and one of whose names did add up to 666. So this all fits a political leader, not the Pope.
Cy Kellett:
All right. But it is something that it’s reasonable to be alert to leaders who deny Christ and deny his divinity, because we do expect that one will come, who, as you said, the final villain of history.
Jimmy Akin:
Yeah, though we shouldn’t leap to the conclusion that just because a political leader is doing that, that he’s the final villain. Because there have been lots of political leaders in the last 2000 years who have said anti-Christian things. And so far, none of them has been the final villain.
Cy Kellett:
I don’t remember if we mentioned this, but you did cover antichrist on Jimmy Akin’s Mysterious World.
Jimmy Akin:
Yes. All the way back in Episode 11. So just when we were first getting started. So people can check that out for more discussion of the antichrist. Also, people can check out the Catechism of the Catholic Church. It has a section dealing with the antichrist. You want to look at paragraphs around paragraphs 675 and 676. And I just really don’t know why they didn’t adjust the paragraph numbers. If one of the paragraph numbers is 676, come on. You’re within 10.
Cy Kellett:
I know. A little editing, and you could have made the one about the antichrist 666. Yeah.
Jimmy Akin:
Exactly. They missed such an opportunity there.
Cy Kellett:
Just move some stuff a little bit later. That is a missed opportunity. Somebody was not on the ball there in the Vatican. That’s probably not the first time or the last time that’ll happen either. Jimmy Akin, proprietor of Jimmy Akin’s Mysterious World, thanks very much.
Jimmy Akin:
My pleasure.
Cy Kellett:
I suppose one of the things that we have learned from the recent decades of our corporate history, of our collective history, is don’t be surprised when dramatic things happen. A lot of dramatic things, even this pandemic of the last year, very dramatic. So it’s perfectly reasonable that we might think those dramatic things that are depicted in the Bible are on their way, those dramatic end times things. It may be. It may not be. But being equipped with a clear understanding of who to expect and what kind of lies to expect from the antichrist does equip us and prepare us for when those days come. And I got to say, as a Catholic, I’m relieved to know it’s not the Pope. That’s a great relief to know it’s not the Pope.
Hey, you can always email us, focus@catholic.com, if you’ve got an idea. As a matter of fact, these last two episodes that we did with Jimmy this week were ideas that were sent to us from listeners. If you have an idea of something you’d like us to cover on Catholic Answers Focus, go ahead and send it to focus@catholic.com. Don’t forget, if you’re listening on Apple Podcast, Spotify, Stitcher, or one of the other podcast services, that five star review and a few words about what you get out of Focus really do help to grow the podcast. If you’re watching on YouTube, we’re glad you are. We’re really growing on YouTube. Thanks for being there. Maybe share it with other people by liking and subscribing down here on the bottom somewhere. If you like and subscribe, that helps to grow us.
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